Question–if we cut military spending, would you consent to also cutting entitlements?
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Point of clarification on the pending case - the bakers appealed a judgment against them by the state civil rights commission, not the gay couple suing, challenging a recent state law prohibiting discrimination. The bakers claim a constitutional right that trumps the state statute.
So, I don’t think homosexual people should feel anything in sex Ed according to this.
“This is your biology, this is how people get pregnant, this is how to avoid it and disease.”
As you note, it’s anti-procreative. These are biological facts, so emotion is irrelevant. If we are talking gender identity that’s a different story–but that’s not what sex Ed (theoretically) is about. It’s about biology and disease not identity or religion. Again, as Sky’s noted maybe it’s changed in the decades since I took it, but biology is biology. However fluid identity may be, sex is still about the gene transmission and disease is still about biology.
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I’m not talking about open, pitchfork-carrying hostility–rather, I’m talking about the subtle sort that manifests so often (in towns small and large).
I think you’re being a bit revisionist in your attempt to differentiate between the present issues and those addressed by the Civil Rights Act. First, the issue of black inferiority was (and unfortunately is), for many whites, a sincerely held belief, and thus their disagreement with racial equality was, in its perverse way, of the ‘good faith’ variety. So insofar as that goes, there’s no daylight between some (most?) of the white supremacists circa CRA and the anti-gay baker circa now.
Second, at the time of the passage of the CRA, there was no society-wide reconciliation regarding the issues pertaining to the status of AAs in society. In fact, I would venture that the current level of social reconciliation vis a vis gay rights is at least the equal to what the social-reconciliation level of AA rights was at the time the CRA was enacted.
How would this differ from saying, circa CRA, ‘The blacks have a valid argument, and so do the religious white supremacists whose attitudes are based in their sincerely-held beliefs’?
- You think the baker who is doxxed and socially humiliated is going to feel like a winner?
- Why would this same argument not apply to the CRA?
As you might have inferred by now, I am at a loss as to how to reconcile your pro-CRA stance with your opposition to the application of the exact same principles in the case of the baker.
If an entity is committed to competing on price (in this case, price = tax rates), I think it is premature at best to assume they can’t figure out way to beat their chief competitor’s new price. And remember: All it takes is ONE country to figure out a way to cut their rates, and our cuts will be for naught. Time will tell, I suppose.
You don’t think they might feel marginalized?
Sex is about gene transmission? C’mon man. You think gene transmission is on the minds of teenagers screwing around in the back of their car?
The whole argument is stupid… 1st off if you are in a customer service biz by law you have to serve the public. If I owned a Cake shop and a dude orders a Nazi cake I gotta make it. When I owned a bar we had all kinds of shit heads. You gotta serve them if they pay period. On the other hand why would you wanna do biz with someone who thinks your scum…IDK? I wonder what these guys legal fees are for this nightmare over a $50 cake… Also whats the deal with rightwingers and cake? Renting wedding space buying honeymoons jewlery ect ect but a $50 cake thats gone too far…Like the cake is baked by Jesus or some shit
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Clarification needed: I was referring to “biological sex”, as distinct from “gender roles/ID”, not procreation vs pleasure. Please reconsider with that usage in mind.
When speaking about anatomy and physiology, why should anybody feel marginalized?
If you want to say that sex-ed has changed through the years, fine. But Skys, to my understanding, was referring to the biology (this was my experience with the class as well).
Possible, but I think it is both reasonable and rational to assume they will have difficulty cutting their rates farther given a) their heavier social entitlements and HC burdens and hence need for tax revenue and b) the fact that their rates are so much lower in absolute terms.
This country holds a corporate tax rate that is nearly TWICE what many European countries have. You really think chopping our astronomical rate down to their level won’t change anything?
You are saying, it’s a basal desire of others/people to spread their genes while fucking without realizing it right? I concur.
I’d be open to discussing a restructuring of that spending, sure. I admittedly don’t know many of the details but I’m sure there is money to be saved there. There’s probably money to be saved lots of places. I personally don’t think cutting spending to the Homeless vets, children’s healthcare, and old peoples self-funded retirement funds is the way to do it but I am not opposed to it as a blanket statement. Politics is all about compromise and give and take.
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Pretty much, for two reasons. First, our tax code is so chock full of deductions that few (if any) corporations big enough to offshore pay the “astronomical” rate. I don’t know offhand what the effective (ie, what they actually pay) corporate rate in the US is, but it isn’t close to the ‘sticker price.’ Maybe a rate reduction would allow corps to fire a few of their tax lawyers, and save a little money that way? Who knows. But I don’t see it being a net benefit for the country.
Second, if a company is committed to paying the lowest rates possible, that’s what they’re going to do. And like I said, it only takes one country cutting its rate below ours to make them more attractive in this regard. It need not be a welfare state a la Western Europe; all it takes is some puny island-nation in the Caribbean. And remember–once the US rate cut makes all those other low-rate countries less attractive, it’ll make our hypothetical Caribbean island-state even more so.
Ok, that’s a very fair outlook which I agree with. My personal opinion is that
A) a lot (though not all by any means) of the negatives you mentioned are partisan hyperbole for party politics, just like “they’re going to take our gunzzz away!!!” on the other side and
B) the amount of debt that we are in is going to take some very hard cuts and some very uncomfortable decisions to fix. This is where certain parts of the healthcare and SS cuts you mentioned above probably are not hyperbole, but real consequences of serious, tangible debt reduction action.
Haha! Yes, totally agree! Unfortunately that was not what I was attempting to get at, but I was writing in a ham handed way and clearly not conveying my thoughts well.
Confining my comments to solely what Skys wrote about sex ed (“this is your pee-pee and this is how girls get pregnant”) is talking about anatomy and physiology, and biological sex–i.e. XX vs XY chromosome transmission. Biological functions that have zero to do with how a person identifies or which chromosome composition a person prefers to get down with in the sack.
Like I said, sex-ed may have drastically changed since I went through it to where it focuses on things like “identity” and “gender roles”, but from my standpoint talking about the biology of gene transmission and disease reduction shouldn’t make anyone feel marginalized.
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I don’t know how to use emoticons but I can tell you are a guy who likes to abuse them 
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In my experience, the biology of gene transmission is covered in Biology class, not Sex Ed.
Discussions regarding disease reduction aren’t of much use if they don’t cover the sort of behavior one engages in.
I’m not talking about complete social reconciliation - but we passed an unambiguous law outlawing racial discrimination. We, as a society, spoke the final word on the issue. That doesn’t imply unanimity - but it’s the highest word we’ve got. It’s messier with gays and marriage and religion, unlike with race.
Because of the difference of good faith and morality. Trying to make the situation apples to apples doesn’t work. Religious white supremacists didn’t have a good faith argument - because race, and its history in America, is different. And that difference is reflected in our national legislation.
He’s still free to do what he wants as a matter of conscience, isn’t he? He should feel like a winner. Again, life isn’t (and shouldn’t be) governed by the prevailing priority of making sure no one’s personal feelings ever get hurt ever. If he gets personally upset over being socially shamed, that’s for him to work out with his therapist - bottom line is on the most important thing (exercising his religion and being free of conscience), he wins.
Because in a lawsuit, there is a winner and loser, not two winners.
Well, for at least one quite compelling reason - Congress has never defined sexual orientation as a protected class.* As I said above, society has not reconciled this one in a way it has for other classes. Therefore, apples and oranges.
Secondly, again, one can “live and let live” re: gays but still have a good faith religious belief that marriage, as an institution, is defined a certain way and in a private setting, you shouldn’t have to compromise that good faith belief.
*We’re kind of batting around the CRA, so I’m talking about that, but states like CO have recognized that protected class, as it is at issue in the SCOTUS case.
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Social security is probably the last place I’d look to cut. This is Basically just giving people their own money back, right? If you squint and look at it right you could probably claims it’s a “tax rebate” if you wanted too. The problem is old people vote, so telling them “we are going to cut your checks 23%” is basically political suicide.
Healthcare is probably a better area to tackle as there are process improvements you could make without cutting the quality, for either the same price or less.
There is almost certainly some efficiency to be had in our medical spending, every country on the planet does it cheaper than we do. Between that and shaving the military budget I’m sure we could find 200-300 billion a year in savings.
That or just invest our social security funds in bitcoin 3 days ago and the whole thing is fine 
No argument there.
“Net benefit” is a philosophical position, so it is open to debate. “Being more competitive” is less philosophical and more practical–one can directly measure aspects of that more easily.
Agreed again, but pairing this with the below quote…
I completely disagree–cost of goods transport and logistics from overseas is a huge component of overall cost of doing business. A company can easily justify it by saying “we’ll cut our tax exposure in half so even the high cost of transport is a net savings over manufacturing here” (18-20%<<35%), but it is much much harder to justify if your tax savings are only 2-3% marginal rate (18%~20%). The bottom line savings overseas are very hard to predict, being very close or below the “noise” threshold.
A company is MUCH more likely to house more operations here in that case for ease of administration among other things.
Not sure what you’re saying here? Less attractive?
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That’s a fair point, true.
The cell biology sure. The um…“practical” biology not so much. I remember my sex ed class differently than you do yours apparently. Oh well.
An absolute necessity. And I’m in favor of social insurance. But math trumps politics.
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Boy I wish this was a more popular sentiment!
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This stuff is driving me crazy. I usually go after right-wing tropes tooth and claw, but there is a good deal of truth to the whole “snowflake” phenomenon.
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